My Name Is Venus Black

Lloyd’s moving debut explores the reverberations of a crime and its aftermath for a teen girl and her family. Venus Black is 13 years old, a seemingly normal teen and good student, when she shoots and kills her stepfather Raymond and is sent to prison. Venus won’t talk about why she committed the crime. Shortly after, her developmentally disabled little brother, Leo, to whom she is very close, goes missing. In 1986, at 19, Venus is released, and she’s desperate to start over. Taking a new name, she makes a life for herself in Seattle, attracting the eye of a local cop, Danny, and befriending her landlord’s nine-year-old niece, Piper, but thoughts of Leo still haunt her. Not knowing whether he’s alive or dead is excruciating, and her overbearing mother, Inez, desperately wants to make amends for the events that led to the shooting. Just as Venus gets settled, information comes to light about Leo’s disappearance that threatens her delicately balanced new life. Lloyd portrays Leo sensitively and adroitly brings the resilient Venus to life, but the narrative is marred at times by clunky prose and too-neat solutions. Still, this is a satisfying tale about family, forgiveness, and moving on, and will have crossover appeal for older teens. [em]Agent: Jane von Mehren, Aevitas Creative. (Feb.) [/em]